Lost in Transition
by Nelly94
Summary: The children of Harry and Ginny Potter are sent back in time to just after the war has ended. What complications will there be as they try to get back home? Don't really get the rating so I'm going for T :L
1. Arrival

**Arrival**

The large, mainly red-headed family were relaxing on a beach, having finally finished rebuilding at least some parts of their lives after the war. A couple were sitting slightly apart from them; a red headed girl was sitting across from a young man with black hair and green eyes that held all the love and devotion he could muster in them as he gazed at her, their low voices not carrying in the soft wind. He laughed at something she said, and threw his head back, feeling so joyous and carefree, something he hadn't felt for quite some time.

Not too far from where this group had settled for the day, the sand began to swirl. One of the many red-heads began to stare, causing the others to look in the general direction. The sand began to swirl in an upwards spiral, and was so fast and thick nothing could be seen through it. Suddenly, the land began to fall, and three people had materialised behind it; two red headed boys and one red headed girl, slightly younger than the other two. They looked around in shock and fear at where they where, doing double takes when they saw the large family staring in their direction, jaws hanging open.

'Well thanks a lot, James! How the hell do we explain this! I told you not to play with it, Dad said it was dangerous, but you just had to touch didn't you! God, why can't you just do as you're told for once in your life!' The young girl exclaimed, shock being quickly replaced with anger.

'It wasn't my fault! I didn't know this would happen!' He retorted, angry as well.

'No, nothing is ever your fault, is it?' She shook her head, and began to storm off around some rocks.

'Lily! Come back! Come on, you can't just walk away!' James called after her. 'Thanks a lot for your help, Al,' he added sarcastically to his other companion.

'I refuse to take part in any more of your arguments. They always leave me ending up worse off,' he casually responded, inspecting his surroundings serenely. 'Should we talk to them?'

'I don't know. We're not supposed to let anyone from the past see us, but they don't know who we are so is it OK?' He answered, unsure of whether to proceed towards the family, or to see where Lily had gotten to.

'Well, you try introducing yourself, without giving _too_ much away, and I'll go see how Lily is. I think if she sees you she may just _avada kedavra_ you,' he said, with a slight smirk on his face. He wandered off around the same rocks Lily had disappeared behind, as James sloped towards the family.

'Hi everyone,' he said nervously, with a slight wave of his hand.

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><p>Not too sure how this story is going to play out just yet, but this had been floating around in my head for about a year now so I thought I should see how it works :)<p> 


	2. Because He's James

**Because He's James**

'Lily!' Al called, after finally spotting her standing at the waters edge. He jogged towards her and stood beside her, looking out at the sea. 'Why'd you walk off?'

'I was going to kill James,' she said simply. 'Why'd you follow me?'

'We stick together,' he said, bumping her hip with his, trying to get a smile out of her. It worked, but only for a short while.

'Why does he always have to mess things up?' She said, frustrated at how foolish her brother was.

'Because he's James?' He replied with raised eyebrows, as though it was obvious. 'He's talking to the others. We think we should be OK as long as we don't let too much slip. I hope,' he added nervously.

'So what do we say to them? 'Hey, how are you? I'm your future daughter/granddaughter/niece?' They'll think we're crazy! We'll be sent to the loony ward at Mungo's! We'll never get back to our time!' She was starting to panic now, and her brother could see that. He turned her body to face him, put his hands on her shoulders, stared into her eyes and said 'Breathe. Everything will be OK, I promise. Besides, we have Aunt Hermione here to help us. If she can't figure it out, no one can.'

She appeared to hear some sense in what he was saying, for her breathing calmed and she looked more relaxed. Just as this happened though, a woman could be heard screaming over the other side of the rocks.

'James,' the siblings muttered in unison, as they sprinted back over the rocks to see their past mother looking like she was about to faint, past father looking a little shell shocked, past Aunt Hermione with a look of concentration on her face, past Uncle Ron looking bemused (but that wasn't new to them), with James looking a bit sheepish while looking at his present mother and father, standing in the exact same spot they had appeared in a few moments earlier. They had their arms folded and a stern look on their faces, though James was sure he saw his dad's had a slightly amused look as well.

'And just what is going on here?' Their mother asked, eyebrows raised.

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><p>I will start to make the chapters longer, but for now they'll stay this sort of length, just to get the story moving along a bit :)<p> 


	3. Temperamental and Experimental

Sorry for the late update, but I went to BISMUN (Bath International Schools Model United Nations) last weekend. It was really fun and I met some people from other countries including America, Germany, Russia and the Czech Repiblic! I got really behind on schoolwork (not to mention sleep! :L) so I've been catching up with it all, and this sort of fell down on the priority list :L

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><p><strong>Temperamental and Experimental<strong>

'Well, you see, we were-'

'What happened was this, right, we-'

'I was trying to help-'

All three children started to explain what had happened, while their parents glanced at each other, then back to their children, with an exasperated air about them.

'Enough,' their mother eventually said, when she had heard enough. 'We take you to ministry for the luncheon and you disappear off! What made you go to the Department of Mysteries? You know it's dangerous, we've told you enough times! But no, you just had to go and see for yourselves, and got sent back in time! And now we've had to come back as well to make sure you stay out of trouble!'

'You didn't have to come back, we can take care of ourselves!' James replied, indignantly.

'Maybe you can, maybe you can't, but the question still stands: what were you doing in the Department of Mysteries?' Their mother replied. Her younger self was staring at her shocked. _I really marry Harry?_ she thought. _I look old in the future! And I've put on weight!_

'It was James' fault!' James' face darkened as his sister said this. 'He dragged me and Al down there, insisting it would be 'fun' and 'harmless', and look what happened! He found some time turners that, of course, being James, he just had to touch, and we got sent back here! Incidentally, why are we on a beach, when after using a time turner you stay in the same place but are just in a different time?' She pondered this last part out loud.

'I don't know! Maybe they were temperamental! Or experimental! But this is the exact reason why you don't go playing in the Department of Mysteries! It's called that for a reason!' Their mother was clearly the disciplinary figure in the family, as their father just simply watched, occasionally looking like he wanted to interject, but he was never able to interrupt his wife when she was in one of her tempers.

'All right, why don't we all just calm down now,' Mrs Weasley said. She and the rest of the Weasley's had been watching this exchange, slightly fearfully as they knew what Ginny could be like if she really got into one of her rants. 'This isn't helping the situation at all. Why don't we all head back to the Burrow and have a cup of tea and some cake. You're all looking a bit peaky.'

She looked at her future daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren with a slightly strange look on her face, then waved her wand and the blankets the Weasley's had been sitting on a few moments before magically shook themselves free of sand and folded in mid-air, before packing themselves in hampers, along with their food and drinks. They all, past and future family members' trudged up the small hill and round the corner until they were hidden from view and able to safely apparate back to the Burrow. James and Albus both had an apparition license, so Lily anxiously ran away from her parents to do side-along apparition with her brothers.

Once back at the Burrow they all went into the kitchen. Mrs Weasley waved her wand once more and the tea pot started to boil, while some cake sliced itself. James went to grab a piece of cake but stopped short slightly when he saw the look his mother gave him.

'But I'm hungry!' He insisted.

'Well you wouldn't be if you had stayed at the luncheon and eaten there, would you?' She replied, with gritted teeth.

James' hand retreated, while his father smirked.

'Now, lets try to get to the bottom of this. You were at the Ministry…' Mrs Weasley prompted.

'We were at the annual luncheon thing at the Ministry. They have it every year to honour dad for defeating the Dark Lord,' James explained. 'It's really dull and boring, so I like to try to liven things up a bit-'

'That's an understatement,' scoffed Lily. 'Last year he set off 300 firecrackers and replaced all the biscuits with canary creams! People were randomly bursting into feathers half way through dad's speech!'

James looked faintly proud of himself, before continuing.

'Anyway, as I was saying, it was boring, as usual, and I wanted to know what it was like in the Department of Mysteries since you told us what happened when you went in there.' He didn't seem to know if he should look at his parents, or his soon-to-be parents. 'It wasn't easy, let me tell you! They've got a whole new bunch of security down there! When we got there we didn't really know what way to go so we were just wandering around, then we came across this room and there was a whole bunch of time turners just lying on the table. I went to investigate and must have done something wrong because, next thing I know, we're back here,' he finished simply. 'How did you know we'd left?' He added, looking at his parents.

'Some of the aurors on my team saw you leave and told us. We wondered what you were up to,' he said. 'We saw what happened, and after sending a patronus to let Ron, Hermione and the aurors know what happened, we followed.'

'So now you're back as well, have you got any idea how to sort this mess out?' Lily asked.

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><p>Thanks to animegirl03, Annabella Prinx and arabelletrix for favouriting, and thanks to andru71, Becca loves monkeys, simdone and Annabella Prinx (again!) for author alerting me! I appreciate it :) xx<p> 


	4. Arrival, Take Two

Someone said in my reviews that it would be a good idea to show the arrival from Ginny or Harry's perspective so this is the first part of that! :) Enjoy!

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><p><strong>Arrival, Take Two<strong>

Ginny POV

I sat across from Harry, feeling peaceful on the beach. Just being able to be myself with Harry was such an amazing feeling, and I hadn't felt so happy in a long time. I was so happy he had come back alive, but whenever I was with him and feeling this way, I would feel so guilty because Fred had died and George was so upset lately. It's only recently he's starting to seem like his old self again, and the war was over nearly six months ago.

I said something that made Harry laugh, but I can't remember what it was. He laughed like the war never happened, like he had never heard his best friend being tortured, like he hadn't been killed, like he had never had to stand by and watch as his friends around him fell. He laughed like he was supposed to.

I suddenly noticed the family weren't making the usual noise they usually do. I turned to look, and Harry followed my gaze. I saw them looking in the direction of the sea, so me and Harry turned to see what had caught my family's attention like that. I saw some sand swirling upwards. I had never seen sand behave that way before. Before I could say comment, the sand dropped and three people suddenly appeared behind it. Three people who I vaguely recognised for some reason…

I heard them shouting at each other then watched one, the girl, storm off around some rocks. One of the boys followed her while the other started to walk towards us. He had a walk similar to someone else's I had seen before, but I couldn't figure out who's…

'Hi everyone,' he said nervously, with a slight wave of his hand. His hair was a dark red colour, not Weasley red, but he could've passed as one of our cousins. 'How are you all?'

'Fine thanks. You?' Ron answered, looking slightly confused.

'I'm good,' the boy answered. 'Nice weather, huh?'

'Yeah it's great,' Percy answered slowly. 'Without being rude, who are you?'

'I was afraid you'd ask that,' he answered with a sigh. 'My name is James. And that's all I think is really wise to tell you. Sorry.'

I was really confused at this point, and I turned to look at Harry, who had a similar look of confusion on his face. If this wasn't so odd and confusing, serious, I'd have laughed at the look on his face.

'Well that's cleared things up, thanks,' George replied sarcastically.

'I'm sorry! I'm really confused and I have no idea what I'm even doing here,' he looked around him, seeming a little lost.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see the sand swirling once more. The whole family turned to look as well, and so did James. Once it settled I saw another two figures appear. Two figures that made me feel very dizzy and scream.

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><p>Ok, maybe Ginny's reaction was probably a little extreme, but how would you feel if your future self turned up! :L<p> 


	5. Two Hermione's

So sorry for the long wait! I was really ill for about a week and just couldn't face doing anything productive, I just wanted to sit and feel sorry for myself :L I know it's not really a long chapter but the next one will be I promise :)

**Disclaimer:** I kept forgetting to do one of these but better late than never! :L I don't own Harry Potter, only JKR :'(

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><p><strong>Two Hermione's<strong>

'We didn't really think that far ahead, all we were thinking about was finding some way of following you to make sure you were OK. The time turners in the Department of Mysteries are there for a reason; they're a mystery! No one knows what they'll do, you could have been sent back to any point in time! It's just luck I guess that sent you back here.'

Their father was starting to be a bit more serious now. Albus guessed his mother had talked to him to make him take the situation more seriously and not like another one of his many adventures.

'I stand by what I said; it's all James' fault,' Lily said, matter-of-factly.

'I don't care who's to blame, as far as I'm concerned, you're all of equal blame. You are all intelligent people who should have had the sense to not do this! We shall discuss some sort of punishment when we get back to our time.'

All three children groaned at hearing what their mother had just said, dreading what lay in store for them when (or if) they returned to their normal time.

'But what if we don't get back?' Lily couldn't stop the fear from creeping into her voice as she said this, and her father squeezed her hand reassuringly.

'Then at least we're all together,' he replied with a smile. 'But now we really do need to start trying to find a way back. Hermione have you got any books that may help us?'

'This is Hermione, of course she's got a book!' Scoffed Ron.

'I think so, let me go check upstairs though.'

She left out of the room and everyone could hear her footsteps on the stairs as she ran up them to get to the room she was temporarily sharing with Ginny. She had found her parents in Australia, and they were due to return any day now, they were just trying to sell their house before they returned to England.

'Well now we have two Hermione's on the job: this Hermione and our Hermione,' Ginny said. 'We'll be back soon enough!' She had absolute faith in her friend and sister-in-law, both past and present.

Molly had just finished making tea and coffee for everyone (it took a while serving so many people, even with magic) and served it. She also slipped James a biscuit, remembering his complaint about being hungry before. Ginny, however, didn't notice. She was too busy looking at her younger self. She couldn't believe how much she had changed. She had definitely put on weight, but that was to be expected after having three children. She also felt more tired and had more lines on her face, but then again she was getting older, and her children had never made life easy for her, especially James. She looked at the younger Harry and, with a pang of jealousy, realized he had hardly changed at all. Sure he had a few more lines on his face and his hair had thinned slightly but on the whole there wasn't much change. How come he still got to look good and she didn't? She would definitely be having words with him later.

At that moment, Hermione came running down the stairs with bright eyes, clutching a large, heavy, old and dusty book that had no title.

'I think I may have found something,' she said, slightly out of breath with excitement.

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><p>Can anyone think of a name that the book could be called? I was a little stuck for ideas :L If you can think of a name can you just leave it in a review or PM me? Thanks! :D<p> 


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